A lack of data hurting police efforts to stop scrap metal thieves

Insulated copper wire, which is frequently brought in for cash, fills bins at E. Schneider & Sons Inc. A 2008 law requires scrap metal dealers to keep track of what is brought in and by whom.

Insulated copper wire, which is frequently brought in for cash, fills bins at E. Schneider & Sons Inc. A 2008 law requires scrap metal dealers to keep track of what is brought in and by whom. (MONICA CABRERA, THE MORNING CALL)

Andrew Brown,Of The Morning Call

Are police doing enough to stop scrap metal crimes?

In August, a Haycock Township man was charged with stealing more than $49,000 worth of catalytic converters from six car dealerships near Quakertown.

On the surface, it seemed like an odd crime. Why would anyone systematically remove 25 emission control devices?

But to law enforcement experts, it was just another example of one of the fastest growing and costly crimes: scrap metal theft.

Driven by the demand for metal in international markets, home burglars have been eschewing jewelry and electronics for tools, wires and piping.

Other thieves, better organized and more ambitious, have been hitting electrical substations, cell towers, telephone lines, railroads and warehouses.

"It's billions and billions of dollars," said Kevin Whiteacre, a criminal justice professor at the University of Indianapolis.

The high financial cost of the crimes has captured the attention of lawmakers, law enforcement officials and business leaders, resulting in new laws, increased enforcement and security improvements in affected industries.

But experts say police won't be able to get the upper hand on the crime until it is nationally tracked by the FBI in its Uniform Crime Report.

"They don't have any way of tracking it at the national level. So it's really up to individual municipal agencies to collect that information and most don't bother," said Whiteacre, who has helped police in Indianapolis collect data on metal-related burglaries.

In the absence of crime data, law enforcement officials often must rely on insurance theft claims, which experts say drastically underestimate the number of crimes that are committed and don't allow police to understand the trends behind the crimes.

Without specific crime data, police agencies can't analyze where these crimes are occurring the most, when the thefts are most often committed, what types of metals are targeted or how many crimes there actually are.

The dearth of information makes it difficult for police to focus their efforts, and makes it impossible for national law enforcement officials to determine if state legislation and current law enforcement practices are working.

"We don't know if we're improving unless we have a way to track this," said Brandon Kooi, a criminal justice professor at Aurora University.

Locally, the Allentown Police Department may be the only department in Lehigh or Northampton counties that tracks metal thefts separately from other types of thefts and burglaries.

Other police departments in the region that responded to phone calls and emails from The Morning Call said they follow the FBI's crime reporting standards, which don't break metal thefts into their own categories.

Big problem

From January 2011 to December 2013, more than 41,000 insurance claims related to stolen scrap metal were filed, according to the National Insurance Crime Bureau.

Pennsylvania ranked fourth in the nation with 2,345 claims. Only Ohio, Texas and California had more.

Nationally, more than 97 percent of the claims were for stolen copper, a metal that locally is fetching at least $2.50 a pound at scrap yards.

PPL Corp., the Allentown power provider, has been a common target of copper thieves. Over the past two years, the utility has dealt with 94 thefts from properties it owns in Pennsylvania.

In the most recent case, which occurred the last week of July, PPL transmission lines were cut along Interstate 81 in Schuylkill County. The stolen wire was valued at $20,000.

The thefts led PPL to post a $1,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of the culprits, beef up security at substations and continue communications with scrap yards. It also started painting its braided wire blue so it would be easily identifiable to scrap yards.

PPL spokesman Joe Nixon said the efforts appear to be working.

"So far this year, we've had 13, which puts us on pace for a significant decline," he said.

Meanwhile, all 50 states have been attacking the crime with tougher laws.

Many of those laws have focused on scrap metal recyclers, in an attempt to cut off the market for the stolen metal. The majority of the laws require recyclers to keep records identifying sellers.

"Essentially, what they are trying to do is lower the perceived anonymity of the people that are selling scrap metal," Kooi said.

In Pennsylvania, the Scrap Metal Theft Prevention Act of 2008 requires scrap metal dealers to keep a record of the weight and type of metal purchased, along with copies of the seller's driver's license and vehicle license plate number.

A 2014 amendment to the law went even further, putting restrictions on the sale of railroad crossing signs, railroad spikes, railroad tracks and any other metals associated with the industry. It also requires the state police to create a registry of approved scrap metal dealers in the state.

More can be done

But experts suggest that these legislative efforts are undermined by the lack of reliable crime data that law enforcement officials could use.

"We have 17-, 18,000 police agencies in the country that are extremely fragmented," Kooi said. "So it's no big surprise that there is no state or national database to track this."

The FBI's Uniform Crime Report — the most widely used crime database in the country — doesn't have a category for metal-related burglaries.

In 2010, the FBI added a category of metal theft to its National Incident Based Reporting System, a more thorough but optional crime database.

But only a third of the law enforcement agencies in the country are submitting information, said Stephen Fischer, spokesman for the FBI's Criminal Justice Information Services Division.

None of the police agencies contacted in the Lehigh Valley said they submitted crime data to the NIBRS.

Whiteacre said the only way that smaller law enforcement agencies will begin to collect data on these crimes is if the FBI mandates it.

Whiteacre said he can't understand why the FBI hasn't included a category for scrap metal theft in its Uniform Crime Report. He pointed out that the FBI report includes categories for appliance, jewelry and even livestock theft.

"They're collecting data on livestock, and yet they're not collecting data on metal theft, which is this multibillion-dollar crime problem," Whiteacre said. "I find it astounding."

The end result is a limited patchwork of local law enforcement agencies that collect information on scrap metal thefts. Even then, the ways departments record the data vary widely, making it difficult for agencies to compare information and cooperate on investigations.

"If you begin to track the data, you can begin to determine where are you are getting hit the most," Kooi said. "Is this a residential problem? Is this a business problem? Are there certain areas of the city that are getting hit more than others?"

William Lake, director of the Allentown police Criminal Investigation Division, said the tracking has allowed police to determine what sections of the city these burglaries occur in the most, and that his investigators have been able to make several arrests.

Lake said police often become aware that copper is stolen from abandoned homes only when water starts flowing from missing pipes. But he said the department's database has allowed the police to pinpoint sections of the city that are most susceptible to this type of crime.

He would not say in which sections of the city scrap metal thefts are most common, because it would tip off criminals.